Last month, I spent several weeks looking for bargains to update my Fall-Winter wardrobe. I found some exceptionally good deals. One of them is this coat from Forever21:

It was originally priced at 50€. I got it for 15€! The only thing I didn’t like about it were the buttons. And as per my mom’s wise words: “You can always judge clothing by the quality of the buttons.” And, you know, if my mom says it, then surely it must be true! So the brown plastic buttons had to go. After a quick search on etsy.com, I found two different types of metal buttons, which I thought might work.

I wasn’t quite sure which of the two would look the best. At first I thought maybe the more elaborate one with the fleur-de-lis on it. But it turns out it blends too much with the tweed fabric, making it hardly visible from a distance.

So I ended up choosing the plain copper buttons. And since they came in a pack of six (for only 3.68€ total – wow), I went ahead and added two extra ones at the collar.

And now of course I’m still not sure about it! Hah! With or without the collar buttons? Or perhaps darker buttons would make for a nicer contrast after all? Aaargh! I’m such a woman sometimes when I can’t make up my mind about silly details. 😱

I’ve been keeping an eye out for bargains lately and it paid off. I got 3 dresses + 1 pair of ankle booties for less than 50€ total! How crazy is that? I’d never find such good deals at local stores. My new favorite web store is New Look; that’s where I got 3 out of the 4 items I bought. Now, I was looking over my orders and realized that they are all black and white … This was definitely not intentional. I guess I happened to be in a black & white kind of mood! In any case, I’ve vowed myself that any future purchase will include more color, before my wardrobe turns into a black & white fest. But I have to admit there’s something about this contrasting combination that I love. Now, I’m almost 8 months pregnant so there’s obviously no chance in Hell I could fit into these right now, but I can’t wait!!! The floral dress will be my main motivation to get that belly flat again! The model is shorter than me, so the dress should actually hit right above my knees, which is the perfect length.

Here’s a useful tip if you find an awesome sale on New Look but then realize that it’s out of stock: bookmark that page! Sometimes those items do sporadically get back in stock for a brief moment at the same discounted price that they were before they sold out. This is how I managed to get dress #4. My size was no longer available and within one day all sizes were completely sold out. I kept an eye on it, and less than one week later, my size was suddenly back in stock. I’m guessing this happens when a customer returns an item back to them, because as soon as I completed my order, the dress was listed out of stock again. So I’m assuming the available quantity was just one lol I’ve seen this happen with other items that I didn’t end up buying but had kept an eye on as well. It pays off to refresh that page several times a day for a week or more. Sounds slightly obsessive, but hey, if I can get a pretty dress for 10 euros or less, I don’t mind! 😛

By the way, if you don’t follow me on Pinterest yet, please do: https://www.pinterest.com/lisakristie/ I pin a ton of items all the time and some of them are great finds that I end up buying myself.

I’ve been meaning to update my wardrobe for quite a while now. It’s been idle for far too long. I got pregnant soon after we married in 2013, so shopping wasn’t really an option anymore with a growing belly. Plus, maternity wear never interested me one bit. Then Sam passed away and that’s when began the lamest year of my life, which was spent grieving and trying to get through this thick fog. And then right when I was starting to emotionally get better, I got pregnant with this little one … So, again … a growing belly and swollen feet meant no shopping for fun stuff.

I’m nearing the end of this pregnancy and for the first time in years, I am now looking forward to completely update my clothes. I’ve done a major cleanup a while ago (which I will post about later). And I basically freed up a ton of room so I could start filling it with new stuff.

One area that needs a major update is: my shoes. While browsing many web shops, I noticed an increased presence of block heels. I’m not quite sure what to think of them. I’ve always preferred slimmer heels, as they look more delicate and feminine – in my opinion anyway. And block heels still scream both “granny” and “90’s” to me. However, I can imagine they might be easier to walk in. I looked through a zillion different models on ASOS and found a few that I might consider giving a chance …

ASOS has been offering free shipping for ages now, but I noticed recently that they also started offering free returns. This could be a great way to try on some shoes and then decide whether I’d keep them or not. Because if I hesitate too much, I noticed that I generally end up not buying at all. Maybe this will prompt me to give block heels a try! I’m still not convinced though … Hmmm?

I’ll be honest: I absolutely hate shopping for shoes. It’s always so difficult to find a pair that is:
-1- Not ridiculously expensive
-2- Feels comfortable
-3- Seems solid enough to survive at least one year of normal wear

So I walked into the first shoe store – which I will not name, but it’s a popular one – and basically everything was of poor quality and 90% was uncomfortable as Hell. I don’t do the whole “breaking in” approach with shoes. Because let’s face it: there is no guarantee that an uncomfortable shoe will ever become comfortable. It either fits nicely or it doesn’t.

I had my eyes set on one pair that felt quite alright, which was bang on budget at 70€ (priced down from 90€). But then this random girl snatched them right in front of my face as I was about to take the box to buy them. I will skip the whole drama that unfolded next. So to cut a long story short: I went to the store across the street while mumbling to myself “I didn’t even like them anyway.” And that’s when I found this pair of lovely Scapa booties!

I tried them on and they fit like a glove. They were well around my budget too, with a price of 75€ (priced down from 150€! wow). Definitely a good deal! Even better than the shoes I didn’t get from the other store, which had a smaller discount and were synthetic; while these are real leather.